Category Archives: Firefox

The most valuable webpage you can see in FIrefox is the about:config page. This is the place where all (well almost all) the internals of FIrefox are revealed to you and you can edit your browser’s behavior. I found a blog entry revealing a couple of tweaks for Firefox 3 which are good to know and I wanted to keep a reference of them,so I am copying them here in case the link ends up dead in the future. Although I found non of them very important at the moment, it’s good to keep track of tweaks like this for future situations. Please note, all the credits of these tweaks go to the original author of the post. Exploring the about:config page will reveal many more tweaks to your browser’s behaviror. If you have any to suggest feel free to do so in the comments section.————————————————————————————

Auto complete in the address bar as you type an address.Majorityof the people out their seems to have a love-hate relationship with theFirefox3’s new address bar (that Mozilla likes to call as the awsomebar). In a humble attempt to tame this address bar we give you somehacks that can reform the smart bar to become the real smart bar.

Enter about:config into the address bar and hit enter.

Click on “I’ll be careful, I promise!” button.

Enter browser.urlbar.autoFill into the Filter text box. Double click on that preference value and change the value to true to enable autofill.

Now, as you type in an address, you can see that not only the drop downlist is shown, but the address bar itself is auto completed for you.

Enabling spell check in text-fieldsBydefault Firefox does spell checking only in multi-line text boxes. Ifyou want the Firefox to spell check the single line text entry fieldstoo, this hack is for you:

Enter about:config into the address bar and hit enter.

Click on “I’ll be careful, I promise!” button.

Enter layout.spellcheckDefault into the Filter text box. Double click on that preference value and change the value to 2.

Tweaking the full screen modeBydefault Firefox 3 hides the location bar and tab bar when you enter thefull screen mode. Here is how to disable this behavior.

Enter about:config into the address bar and hit enter.

Click on “I’ll be careful, I promise!” button.

Enter browser.fullscreen.autohide into the Filter text box. Double click on that preference value and change the value to false to disable hiding of location and tab bar.

If you just want to disable the hiding animation, set browser.fullscreen.animateUp to 0.

Turn On Color Profile SupportTheGood news is that (unlike Firefox2) Firefox3 contains a built-inadvanced color profile support, which makes Firefox 3 compete easilywith any desktop image viewers/editors in terms of color support. Thebad news is that this mode is disabled by default. This is what youshould do to enable the color profile support.

Enter about:config into the address bar and hit enter.

Click on “I’ll be careful, I promise!” button.

Enter gfx.color_management.enabled into the Filter text box. Double click on that preference value and change the value to true to enable color profile support.

Always display the go buttonBydefault Firefox 3 displays the Go button only when you are editing theaddress in the location bar. This is how you can display it always.

Open userChrome.css file in your profile directory using notepad.

Add the following line to the end of the file: #go-button { visibility: visible !important; }

Restart Firefox.

If you don’t want to tamper with the userChrome.css file, here is an extension that does the same for you.

Make the location bar display only typed addressesDont want the location bar to show entries in your bookmark or history? Here is what you should do.

Enter about:config into the address bar and hit enter.

Click on “I’ll be careful, I promise!” button

Enter browser.urlbar.matchOnlyTyped into the Filter text box. Double click on that preference value and change the value to true.

Change the number of suggestions displayed in the Location bar menuBydefault Firefox 3 displays upto 12 results in the drop down list as youtype an address. Here is how to change this number.

Enter about:config into the address bar and hit enter.

Click on “I’ll be careful, I promise!” button.

Enter browser.urlbar.maxRichResults into the Filter text box. Double click on that preference value and change the value to any positive number.

Add the following line to the end of the file: #feed-button[feeds] { display: none !important; }

Restart Firefox.

Hide the star icon from the location barYoumay be a keyboard junkie or you may be too used up to the old ways thatyou’ll never use the star icon sitting up in the location bar. If younever use it, why let it be there? Here is how to remove the star iconfrom location bar.

Open userChrome.css file in your profile directory using notepad.

Add the following line to the end of the file: #star-button {display: none !important;}

Restart Firefox.

Disable single-click-select-all in the location bar.Oneof the real pain in the neck feature of Firefox is that itautomatically selects the entire address in the location bar if youclick anywhere near it. You just wanted to correct a typo in theaddress, but instead of putting the cursor at the clicked location,Firefox selected the entire address. Without looking into the screen,you corrected the typo and now the entire address is gone. Now buddy,start typing again, says Firefox. Here is how to make the behavior more‘humane’.

Enter about:config into the address bar and hit enter.

Click on “I’ll be careful, I promise!” button.

Enter browser.urlbar.clickSelectsAll into the Filter text box. Double click on that preference value and change the value to false.

Reduce the size of the back buttonThismay not be that evident at first, but will soon reveal to be ano-brainier once you know it. This is all you have to do: Right-clickon Firefox’s toolbar, and choose Customize. In the dialog box, select“Use small icons.”

Disable blinking textSorry, Mr. Blinking Text, you are not welcome. Here is how to stop all blinking text:

Enter about:config into the address bar and hit enter.

Click on “I’ll be careful, I promise!” button.

Enter browser.blink_allowed into the Filter text box. Double click on that preference value and change the value to false.

As the name says, this firefox extension allows you to upload/download files from any website using a friendly interface. Upload files/photos/videos to Flickr, Picasa, Youtube, Box.net(1GB of free space), Facebook etc…